On Sun, Aug 15, 1999 at 10:39:21PM +0800, Beau Kuiper wrote:
> A PC is closer to a swiss army knife IMO :)
>
> Count me as wrong then (except bout the NT part, because it is true when I
> tested it). However there are other reasons to choose a dedicated router over a
> full computer:
>
> 1) Better security: There arn't many things running on a router to go wrong and
> to let people in (although they are not invulnerable).
umm. The Cisco 25xx routers at my work support telnet (ick) as the only
protocol for remote administration. Telnet sends passwords in clear text
over the internet.
The Linux routers I set up have exactly one port open -- ssh. Ssh is
good for security, telnet is bad.
Furthermore, I can put any additional stuff I want an the linux box.
For example -- I needed to restrict the bandwidth to certain colocated
servers sitting behind the Linux router. I downloaded iproute2, and set
up some rather specialized bandwidth controls that would otherwise have
cost _major_ amounts of money. With Linux the whole Linux router cost
about $500 (with 4 100baseT NICs even). With your avarage Cisco, you pay
a huge premium for their custom NICs. Ours cost $20 each.
> 2) Better reliabilty: Routers have no hard drives AFAIK or other PC
> components that could unexpectedly fail. If it does acutally fail, just unplug
> it and replace it. PCs tend to need long configuration phases.
Backups work well. If my Linux router falls over, I can restore the
important config files from backup to a different box in under an
hour.(I pipe tar via ssh over the network to run backups). Even with a
cisco, you would want to have a spare lying around (or a very expensive
service contract), and backups of your config files...
> 3) Smaller: when you have 6-7 servers in a room, you are really happy for small
> devices, and if routers are anything like switches in size, they are much
> smaller than any computer.
So buy your router in a 1U or 2U rackmount case. You can get a very nice
Linux box in a 1 rack unit case for about $1000.
> 4) Lots of pretty lights (not sure if routers have them though): Pretty lights
> send people into trances, great for bosses :).
None of my Cisco boxes have any pretty lights. Sorry to disappoint.
> Of course, all of my arguements are probably bogus or can be worked around.
>
> Keeping the flames burning,
Sizzle, sizzle. :)
-Erik
--
Erik B. Andersen Web: http://www.xmission.com/~andersen/
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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